


Serena is Out of Usable Pokemon

by BlueNightmare



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series)
Genre: Abduction, Aged-Up Character(s), Bondage, F/F, F/M, Gags, Humiliation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 13:02:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16933722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueNightmare/pseuds/BlueNightmare
Summary: Serena fails in her efforts to stop Team Flare, and faces the consequences. Shameless bondage fic from the past.





	Serena is Out of Usable Pokemon

**Author's Note:**

> Another old work, republished here for archiving purposes. Originally published by me in October 2013 and August 2016 (as two works). It's mostly the same as it was back then, so it's probably not up to the quality of recent stuff. Or maybe it is. I don't know. It was popular enough anyway.

The Mightyena howled in triumph, its feral eyes aglow with the instinctive desire to kill, as its opponent collapsed to the hard metallic floor.

Tears of horror sprang to Serena’s grey eyes at the sight of her beloved Meowstic twitching weakly, feebly clinging to consciousness, bruised and bleeding from half a dozen wounds. Her feline companion had been at a severe disadvantage from the start, a Psychic type made to face a Dark type in battle, but neither girl nor cat had been prepared for... for _this._

The Mightyena had been vicious beyond belief, the ensuing violence far worse than would have been acceptable in a sanctioned competition. Its sharpened claws and fangs had ripped bloody trails through Meowstic’s clean white fur, the slavering beast giving no quarter to its helpless foe even when it was obviously beaten. All the while its trainer had encouraged it to bite and slash and kick, tearing Meowstic to shreds, enjoying the sight of his opponent’s Pokemon in agony as no proper trainer would.

Serena’s Pokemon never stood a chance.

She hadn't wanted to make her poor Meowstic face it, she told herself through her tears as she fumbled in her satchel for the Poke Ball she needed to recall her companion to safety. She had known it would end badly, but she had no _choice_. All of her other Pokemon had already been defeated, worn down in turn by the constant stream of identically-dressed challengers she had been forced to face since entering the hidden laboratory, and she had long ago run out of medicine.

Worse, this was no ordinary battle. No ordinary opponent.

The Mightyena’s trainer sneered at Serena as the blonde girl sank to her knees, the trembling in her legs no longer permitting her to stand. The white light of the crippled Meowstic’s return to its ball reflected from the man’s opaque red sunglasses.

Red, red, red. Everything about the man was red. His glasses. His gaudy suit. His glossy, styled hair. Even the walls around them throbbed with a fiery orange glow, the countless lights set into every inch of the thick steel infusing everything in sight with a hideous vermilion glow. It hadn't bothered Serena before, but now, with all of her partners defeated and wounded, the endless red turned her stomach.

...No, that was an excuse. It was fear.

She hadn't even _thought_ about what it would mean to lose until now. She had just charged ahead and attacked the criminal gang called Team Flare with her powerful Pokemon at her side, certain that she would defeat them as she always had in the past. She had been overconfident, careless despite all that was at stake.

Now she was completely defenseless, and the red-suited thugs of Team Flare were closing in on her. 

Serena had beaten most of them already, knocking out each one of their many Pokemon when they had met on several previous occasions, but now her own team of allies had been disabled as well. Without them, she was just an ordinary eighteen-year-old girl... and without _their_ Pokemon, Team Flare were still a ruthless gang of adults in the depths of their own lair.

This time, she realized as her shaking hand placed Meowstic's Poke Ball back into her satchel with the rest, she would not be getting out of this with a quick paying of prize money and a trip into town to heal her partners.

"Uh-oh," one of the grunts mocked as they emerged from the laboratory maze and surrounded her, their much taller forms looming menacingly over the kneeling girl. The fiery light made his skin look as red as his suit, giving him an almost demonic appearance. "Looks like someone's run out of Pokemon."

"I bet you thought you were _so smart_ when you knocked out my Manectric with one blow," a female member taunted, frightful malice in her voice as she stared down at the young trainer through her tinted glasses. The women of Team Flare were dressed just like the men and were no less cruel and immoral. "Well, who's stupid now, kid? Coming down here all by yourself, trying to play hero..."

Serena swallowed hard as she gazed up at the grunts, sick with apprehension. Her fear was no longer for her Pokemon, but for herself. "L-look... I..."

The young trainer's plea was cut off by a bloodthirsty growl from the still-loose Mightyena. It lumbered across the floor toward her, saliva dripping from its bared fangs, blood-drenched claws clicking against the metallic surface. Serena shrank back as the beast approached; it seemed bigger than her now that she was on her knees, and she could smell blood and sweat along with its animal musk.

"Easy, boy," crooned its trainer, grinning widely as he advanced. "Don't hurt her unless she tries to run for it."

They weren't going to let her go. Serena had known, somehow, but hearing it out loud crushed her lingering hopes. After seeing what the vicious Mightyena had done to her Meowstic, she wasn't about to do anything to incur its wrath herself. All of a sudden she felt cold, horribly cold, and it wasn’t just the chill of the steel floor seeping through her stockings.

"Take her bag," urged one of the four... five... six grunts, and before Serena could react, one of the men stooped down to her level and wrenched her satchel from her shoulder.

She cried out as the pink bag was torn away from her, alarm surging through her body. _Everything_ was in that bag! Her supplies, her money... her poor, unconscious Pokemon in their Poke Balls... she couldn't let them take it from her! She lunged, trying desperately to snatch it back, but another snarl from the Mightyena swiftly cowed her into submission. Self-preservation overrode even her concern for her companions, as much as it brought her shame.

She knew then that she wasn't the person she had thought herself to be. In her head she had been brave, an amazing trainer, the only one who could stop Team Flare and their plots, but all of that had fallen to pieces, binging her crashing back to earth. It had been a fantasy. Tears trailed down her cheeks as she watched the criminals rifle through her belongings, looting her purse and the spheres which contained her beloved Pokemon. She was no hero, not even a good enough trainer to protect her companions, much less to command them well when it mattered. She was just a stupid, reckless girl. 

"What do we do with her now?" one of the men asked.

"The holding cell's already in use," a woman murmured, studying the crestfallen girl, smiling as her tears splashed upon the floor. "Tie her up and put her in one of the storage rooms. Do it _properly_ , and keep a guard on her, too. She'll make a useful hostage if any of her friends try to interfere."

Although Serena could not bring herself to look away from the Mightyena's yellow eyes, she heard every word that the Flare grunts spoke, and they made her tremble with apprehension. She was _not_ looking forward to being tied up, but she was out of options for escape. If she tried to get away now, she had no doubt that the savage Pokemon would kill her.

"All right. C'mon, up." The woman's voice from behind her was clearly impatient... but Serena's body refused to move. Her eyes were still locked on the Mightyena's, her rigid limbs frozen in fear. She had seen half a dozen of the beasts before in friendly battles and never blinked, but this one struck such terror into her heart that she was on the verge of screaming just from the sight of it. If only she had her...

"I said _up_." Rough fingers gripped Serena's ponytail and hauled her upward. Pain ripped through her scalp, bringing tears to the young trainer’s eyes and a shaking whimper to her lips, but the female grunt ignored the pitiful sounds and forced her to stand on her wobbling legs. A brutal shove to her back propelled her forward. This was it. She was their prisoner now.

The rest of the grunts began to disperse as Serena stumbled onward at the bidding of her captor, heading deeper into the foreboding underground lab. The Mightyena stepped back with its trainer to allow them to pass; with that wretched animal safely out of her line of sight, the girl's grey eyes went to the grunts holding her possessions. Her bag, her equipment, even her money were replaceable, but her Pokemon... she could see them being carried away before her eyes...

"What's going to happen to them?" she squeaked as she was forced into a long hallway, the relentless orange light of the central chamber giving way to walls of plain grey steel. She could no longer see the red-and-white balls that contained her companions, and the notion that she might never see them again refused to leave her mind.

"Aw, worried about your pets?" The mocking voice of the male trainer she had lost to echoed through the passageway. He was coming as well, Serena realized, and the constant click of claws against steel told her that the Mightyena was not far behind. "I reckon we might get them as a reward for taking you out of the picture. Gonna put in for that cute little Meowstic of yours if we do..."

"Please don't..." Serena whispered, hating how pathetic she sounded. It seemed as if she were about to break into full-fledged sobs, and she despised it even more because that outcome was not truly out of the question. The same red-suited grunts she had defeated with ease in the past were now in full control of her fate, and after the dismissiveness with which she had treated them when she had been the victor, being in their power was galling. Being made to beg them for mercy felt as if a knife had been thrust into her proud heart. "Leave them alone, please..."

The pair of underlings chuckled in response, guiding her into a room at the end of the corridor. Just as expected, it appeared to be a storage room, metal shelving covering every otherwise blank steel wall. Boxes inhabited almost every inch of space, their contents hinted at only by a serial number on the side of each of them. The light within the room was dim, only one of the two fluorescent tubes set into the ceiling currently in operation, but at least the illumination they gave off was tinged only a sickly grey. Serena was very tired of the sight of red.

“Mightyena, guard the door,” the male ordered, and the Dark-type Pokemon obediently sat on its haunches in the middle of the room’s only exit. “You want me to tie her up, or are you gonna...”

“Let me handle it,” the woman interrupted, her lips curled into a cruel smile as she stared down their captive. Not being able to see her eyes behind the thick red sunglasses only made her seem more inhuman to Serena. “After the beating she gave my Pokemon before... _and_ back in the factory... I owe her a little something. Get me some rope, there should be plenty in here.”

Serena bit her lip as the man began to scan the numbers on the boxes; she could feel the Mightyena staring at her from the door through its yellow eyes, though she couldn’t bear to look at the vicious creature. The female grunt kept her gaze locked on the trainer girl as her colleague hunted, her glee at her victim’s plight plain on her face. The stylised flame of the Team Flare emblem was everywhere, traced onto every one of the hundreds of boxes that surrounded her. There was nowhere Serena could cast her eyes that didn’t further cement her hopelessness.

Nor could she think of a way she could get out of this mess. She had no doubt that Calem could defeat these Team Flare thugs - her rival was so strong that even she had never beaten him - but if Team Flare were planning to use her as a hostage against him, it didn’t matter how skilled he was. He would not risk her life, and Pokemon could only do so much.

“Here ya go.“ The male grunt tossed a bundle of ropes to the female from across the room, the twisted strands thick and coarse. “Do your thing.”

Serena swallowed as the woman approached her, stretching one of the cords between her hands. “Can’t you just... lock me in here? You’ve already taken my Pokemon, what could I possibly...?”

“Shut it, kid. Serena, wasn’t it?” The feminine underling took hold of Serena’s upper arms and roughly turned her around, gloved fingers digging deep into the trainer’s soft skin. “You’re gonna pay for getting in our way at the factory and the power plant.”

“And Glittering Cave,” the male added helpfully, watching them from his place beside the door. His fingers scratched behind the ears of his Mightyena.

“Yeah, that too.” The grunt yanked Serena’s arms behind her back, ignoring her pained gasp as her shoulders were wrenched back, and crossed her wrists. “You were a tough enough kid,” she went on as she began to lash Serena’s hands together. “You could have just joined Team Flare instead. I’m sure a _great_ trainer like you could have come up with the five million, easy. Maybe then you’d have been spared when the weapon goes off.”

“I-I’d never.” Serena gritted her teeth as the ropes began to curl against her flesh. The stiff fibers scratched her wrists as they constricted, tightly securing her arms together. Even the jabs of pain that passed through her arms with every over-enthusiastic tug from her captor could not distract her from the awful truth; that her failure and her capture had doomed not only her and her Pokemon, but potentially everyone she loved. Her family, her friends, everyone she had met on her journey. If Team Flare were able to use the weapon they had discovered... if she didn’t stop them before it was too late...

The grunts laughed callously as her tears fell anew. For those not a part of Team Flare, there would be no pity.

Knotting Serena’s bindings with one last vicious tug of the ropes, the woman forced Serena to the floor and dropped to her knees behind her. “We’re not done yet by a long shot,” she whispered into the young trainer’s ear, reaching for another length of rope.

Preparing herself for more discomfort, Serena stared straight ahead at the storeroom wall and the man and Pokemon standing in the door-frame. Both of them were staring back at her, as she had expected, but while the Mightyena’s yellow eyes gazed hungrily at her tear-stained face, the tinted sunglasses of the grunt were aimed somewhat lower...

Her cheeks took on a red stain of their own as she realized just how haphazardly wide her legs had been spread, and how far her skirt had slipped up her thighs. Blushing furiously, she closed and lowered her legs, glaring daggers at the leering pervert... only to cry out in pain as her elbows were suddenly jerked together behind her back by his partner. “Aagh! St-stop!”

The female grunt tightened the ropes without mercy, pressing Serena’s elbows far closer to each other than was comfortable, and began to wind the next rope around them to keep them that way. “Can you get over here?” she called to the male, fully aware of where his eyes had been wandering just now. “Take her stockings off for me.”

“W-w-what?” Chewing on her lip in intense discomfort as her arms were painfully lashed together, Serena threw a wary glance at the approaching male grunt. “D-don’t you touch me! Why do you need to- aah!”

Another knot, sadistically strict, and the young trainer found her elbows almost touching. This had gone beyond restraining her; now they were just being cruel for the sake of it. This was the woman’s revenge for being humiliated in their previous encounters, not once but twice... and it hurt like hell.

“Let’s see here...” the male grunt murmured, seizing Serena’s ankles and tugging them upward to his level. The young trainer found her upper body catapulted backward into the female grunt’s lap as she was manhandled against her will, leaving her staring up at her captor’s scornful faces as her shoes were plucked from her feet and tossed aside. Even more humiliating, her skirt had slipped down her thighs to bunch around her hips, giving the perverted male a clean view of her small black underwear as he worked at stripping away her tight grey stockings.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she pleaded as the smooth fabric was drawn past her knees, then carefully dragged over her shins toward her feet. Every inch of skin that was newly exposed to their eyes brought a fiercer blush to her cheeks.

“Make me,” the grunt responded, grinning broadly as his hands caressed every contour of her legs.

The female cleared her throat in irritation. “Give them here,” she ordered, extending her hand towards her comrade. “And see if you can find me some duct tape, will you?”

The male grumbled something under his breath, annoyed that his peep show had come to a close, but obediently he handed the woman the pair of stockings he had plundered and returned to the shelves near where he had found the rope, searching the shelves for yet another box. As glad as she was that his lustful eyes were no longer on her body, Serena found herself trembling in renewed anxiety. Why did they need duct tape, too? Was it for her?

While she waited for her second bath of supplies, the female grunt dumped Serena from her lap onto the floor and turned her around, pulling her bare legs towards her. “You don’t look nearly uncomfortable enough, kid. Here, let me have your leg for a bit...”

Serena winced as she watched the woman bend her leg backward at the knee, curling it behind her, but knew better than to struggle. The Mightyena was still in the room, waiting for the order to attack, and she was more afraid of its bloodied claws than she was of even her criminal abductors. The prodding of her heel against her behind broke her out of her dismal thoughts, her leg bent back a little further than was comfortable, but she could already see the rope in the woman’s hands once again. She realised, with a heavy heart, that she would need to get used to the uncomfortable position.

She was correct, of course. As Serena lay helplessly on the floor, the grunt began to lash her ankle to her thigh, binding the two parts of her body together. Foot after foot of rope was wound around the trainer’s leg, further trapping it against itself, ensuring that she would find it impossible to straighten out the limb; when the grunt was finally done, every part of Serena’s bare leg was covered in a network of coarse, chafing ropes.

Serena fought to stop herself from crying more than she had already as her other leg was taken and bent, defiantly biting down on her lip as she felt herself being restrained yet further. She loathed having her freedom taken away from her like this, especially when her Pokemon were in danger. The only thing holding back the despair that threatened to overwhelm the pretty young trainer was her more immediate disgust at her cruel, perverted captors, and almost as much at herself for her failure. When she was alone and helpless it would all come crashing down on her, but for now the bite of the ropes and the touches and leers of the Flare goons were enough to occupy her miserable mind.

“Hey, I found some tape.” The triumphant voice of the male goon resounded through the storeroom as he turned back to the women, his hands full of rolls of thick silver duct tape. “Think this is enough?”

“Just sit it down there.” The woman nodded toward the floor next to Serena’s discarded stockings, and as her comrade obediently deposited the rolls on the floor, she completed her last circuit of rope around her prisoner’s leg, binding her ankle to her thigh just as she had with its twin. A quick test of her new bonds told Serena that standing up, or even stretching out, was now out of the question.

“Isn’t this enough?” She whispered, the contortions forced upon her body by the ropes driving her insane. She knew that she wasn’t getting out of these on her own, no matter how hard she struggled. They were too tight, too complex. Why couldn’t they have just locked her up?

The woman snorted as she brought Serena upright, resting her on her rope-sheathed legs, and turned her around to face the door. “No, it’s not enough. You can still talk, for one thing.” Then, with a mocking smile that the girl couldn’t see, “Hold still.”

So they were going to gag her, too. Serena knew that she shouldn’t have been surprised, but the idea still repulsed her even more than the concept of being trussed up like this. At least for now the woman seemed content to leave her mouth alone, capturing the trainer’s bare ankles instead and bringing them together beneath her haunches. There was very little room left to maneuver Serena’s restricted legs with all the ropework already covering them, but the grunt managed to cross the girl’s ankles over one another, forcing her knees to split apart in opposition. Before Serena could even think about moving her limbs out of this even more uncomfortable position, she found her feet lashing them together in the awkward configuration, her ropework as tight as ever.

The cold air against her thighs and the male grunt’s appreciative grin told Serena that in this stressful new arrangement, her skirt no longer protected her modesty as it should. Blushing and feeling utterly wretched, Serena lowered her head to escape his hungry gaze. Closing her legs was no longer an option; she could barely move her lower body at all. She just hoped that he wouldn’t take it further...

“Guess I’m all out of rope.” The female sounded regretful, despite the coarse webs of the stuff already imprisoning Serena’s legs and arms. “Good thing I’ve got some tape too, huh?”

Her hand darted out and picked up one of the many rolls of tape that her colleague had found, as well as one of Serena’s stockings. The pretty trainer’s forehead furrowed in puzzlement. Exactly what was she going to do with that?

The Flare grunt loomed over her from behind and reached in front of her, the stocking in hand, and began to work the legging inside out. Serena wrinkled her nose at the smell as the side of the fabric that had spent days pressed against her foot was exposed to the open air, not liking where this was going. There hadn’t been time to be studious about washing her clothing in the last few days, not with events in Kalos moving at such a blinding pace, but the stomach-turning scent flowing from the garment made her regret it.

When the stocking was balled up and pressed against her lips, she regretted it even more.

“Mm-nnh! Mm-nhh!” She shook her head violently, her blonde ponytail flailing about, keeping her lips pursed tightly shut. They wanted to put that in her mouth? No way was she letting that happen. How disgusting could these creeps get?

“I really think you should open up.” The woman taunted her with the stocking, rubbing it against her nostrils, forcing her to inhale the sweaty scent. “My friend here might be enjoying the sight of your panties a little too much, Serena, but I bet he’d like to see what’s underneath even more. I’m not going to let him do that, of course... even I’m not quite that cruel... but I might change my mind if you make this harder than it has to be.”

Serena recoiled at the threat, her grey eyes wide. As horrified as she was that they would stoop this low, she had no doubt that they would carry out the threat if she held out. The man’s red-shielded gaze was already practically burning a hole through her underwear, and it wouldn’t take much to convince him to take the next step. Whimpering softly, Serena closed her eyes tight and reluctantly let her mouth slide open.

The wadded stocking was quickly thrust past her lips, filling up her jaw and pressing down on her tongue. The fetid footwear tasted even worse than it smelled, and it took only moments for her saliva to carry the flavor to every corner of her mouth. Serena screwed up her face in utter disgust, her nauseated groan half-stifled by the rapidly dampening mass of cloth.

“Heh heh... good girl. I’ve been wanting to do that since the first time we met.” The female grunt bit off a length of silver tape from the roll and plastered it over Serena’s lips, smoothing it down over her slightly puffed-out cheeks. “Not so defiant now, are we? Not so high-and-mighty.”

Serena was silent as the woman pasted another layer of tape over her mouth, then a third and a fourth, covering everything beneath her face in a mask of sticky silver. There would be no spitting the sweat-infused stocking out, she knew; she was stuck with the horrid taste and the oppressive, mouth-filling thickness until somebody came to rescue her, or until her captors deigned to remove her gag. The idea of long-term captivity was not a prospect she wanted to entertain, though if she did end up a permanent prisoner, at least that would indicate that somebody else had foiled Team Flare’s plans...

“Just a little more to go,” the woman cooed in what might have been a reassuring tone had it not come from one of these ruthless criminals. The other stocking was taken up and pulled inside-out, just like the first, another layer of the foul scent imposing itself on Serena’s nostrils as the damp inner fabric emerged. At least they couldn’t force it into her mouth with its pair, now that her lips were sealed by layers of tape... but what did they mean to do?

She soon received her answer. The grunt pulled the garment tightly over Serena’s eyes, wrapping it around her head as a blindfold, hampering her precious sight. Serena wailed into her gag, but the cry caught in her throat as she realized that she could still see through the thick grey cloth, at least a little. The murky light of the storeroom penetrated the fragrant stocking enough that she could make out the red shape of the male grunt at the door and the black mass of his Mightyena, still eager for blood. This wasn’t as bad as she had thought, though the scent of her sweaty feet had now multiplied.

It was not to last. “Aaaand some more tape to hold it on,” the female grunt sang in a far-too-cheerful voice as she pulled a length of duct tape from the roll and slapped it over Serena’s blindfolded eyes, sealing her into complete darkness. The tape was wound around her head twice before she was through, the strong adhesive pulling against Serena’s neat blonde hair and blotting out even the tiniest cracks of light from the edges of the stocking.

Utter despair flooded her faltering heart as her sight was taken away. She began to sob, her whole body shaking, ignoring the pain from the tight ropes rubbing hard against her flesh. 

_Please... I can’t take this anymore. I can’t do this. Calem, Shauna, someone, please... please help me. I need you. I can’t do this._

“Aw, poor kid. I was almost feeling sorry for you for a minute there.” The female grunt could not quite manage to sound sad. “Then I remembered I had some more tape. I think I can make it even harder for you to escape, Little Miss Serena! What do you think of _that_?”

Serena’s response was muffled to a thick little murmur by her revolting gag. The taste of her sweaty feet was overpowering, the awful smell still filling her nasal passages. She didn’t know whether she would prefer to bathe or to vomit, but neither was looking like it would be an option for her anytime soon. She would just have to take it.

She soon felt herself being dragged backwards across the floor, her shins sliding against the metal panels beneath her, the ropes around her thighs and shins chafing painfully against her skin. Her arms were thrust against something hard and metallic, pressing the tightly bound limbs into her back and sending a bolt of agony through her already straining shoulders. It was most likely one of the square poles that supported the shelving; she hadn’t seen anything else that fit the bill when she was brought into the storeroom. They planned to tie her to that as well? 

This was more than overkill. Overkill had been the blindfold and the gag and the way they crossed her ankles, leaving her underwear shamefully exposed. _This_ was pure spite.

She heard the ripping of more tape from the roll, and in moments felt its adhesive surface pasted against her the bare skin of her aching upper arm. The Flare grunt moved fast, unrolling the tape around Serena’s torso toward her front, then wrapping it above her small breasts, tightening her blouse over her chest as it passed. As Serena sniffled and wept in disgrace and mounting discomfort, the tape continued to encircle her, passing back behind her body and binding her against the pole. Even the tiniest dregs of freedom were being taken away from her.

The sound of the male grunt’s lewd chuckles filled her ears as she felt the tape being wrapped again and again around her torso and the pole, loop after loop after loop. Sometimes it ran over her bust, sometimes below, but every time it stretched her blouse even further over her breasts, accentuating her modest chest between the silvery circuits. As if it wasn’t bad enough having her underwear exposed, she lamented, disgusted as much with herself as with her perverted captors.

By the time the grunt abandoned her chest and moved down to her stomach, using yet more of the duct tape to bind Serena’s midsection to the pole, it was difficult even to breathe. By now she had given up protesting anything they did to her. Her proud will had been broken. No amount of training with her Pokemon had prepared her for a situation this. The pretty trainer let them do as they wanted, binding her tighter and tighter; it no longer mattered how much tape they used. She had passed the point of being able to break free long ago, back when they were only using rope.

She couldn’t move. Her arms were immobilized, painfully twisted behind her back. Her legs were spread wide, folded and bound, and she could feel her skirt being taped to her waist, held far above her thighs. She was blindfolded, gagged and suffering through the most rancid taste she had ever experienced, anchored to the shelving and helpless to alleviate her considerable discomfort in even the slightest way.

Helping her Pokemon was beyond her. She couldn’t even help herself.

“All right, I’m going to report to the boss.” The woman rose, her boots clacking against the floor as she moved towards the door. They were done. They were finally, _finally_ done. “Close the door behind us and lock it, and stay on guard here until you’re relieved... and if she makes too much noise,” she added, raising her voice to be sure that Serena would hear, “feel free to come in here and discipline her. Use whatever methods you please. I will bring you her Meowstic later. Personally I’m hoping to get that Absol of hers...”

Their footsteps withdrew into the hall, and the storeroom door slammed shut, the sound of a lock snapping into place the last noise Serena would hear from the grunts for a while.

She cried for a while, letting her emotions burst forth now that there was nobody around to ridicule her, powerless to stop herself even with the threat that the grunts had left her with still hanging over her head. Her wracking sobs echoed through the room and repeated themselves back to her, only serving to remind her of the depths to which she had let herself fall. Once so sure of her skills and her talent, the girl’s pride had now been crushed beneath the stylish boots of Team Flare’s thugs. Now she could do nothing. _Nothing._

Even the slightest movement was beyond her. With her wrists crossed over she could not reach the knots that bound her hands, much less untie the cruel ropes that pressed her elbows together and made her shoulders ache so fiercely. Her legs would not unfurl, her ankles rooted to her thighs by endless coils of stiff, rough rope. Even closing her legs to hide her exposed underwear was out of the question. She was humiliated as well as helpless, and it was killing her courageous spirit more with every passing second.

Eventually, crushed by her fear and misery, mired in the scent and taste of her sweaty stockings, Serena lost even the strength to cry. Her worries for her Pokemon and her friends and herself, once so vivid and raw, faded away as weariness claimed her mind. Even rescue could wait. This was her only escape.

Her tormented body going limp, she fell into a nightmare-plagued sleep.

~ ~ ~

How long had passed since they had left her here, Serena didn't know.

With her tearful eyes buried under layers of thick silvery tape, her vision protected from the strong-smelling adhesive only by the thin fabric of her stolen stocking, It was impossible for the young trainer to judge how many minutes, even hours had flowed by as she knelt here on the frigid metal floor, weary and broken. There were no sounds to keep her company but her own strained breaths and the occasional muffled sob, no distractions from her fear for her beloved Pokemon but to dwell on the constant, overpowering discomfort.

She had never felt so miserable in her entire life, and there was no escape.

Her arms ached fiercely, still bound painfully behind her back at elbow and wrist, the thick ropes chafing against her bare skin with every tiny, desperate, futile movement. Cold gnawed at her defenseless shins, wrapped tight against her thighs by more coils of rope than could ever have been required, keeping her on her knees no matter how hard she strained to rise. Beneath her rear end, her ankles remained crossed one over the other, ensuring that her knees stayed apart in opposition and that her pleated red skirt rode up her thighs to reveal the simple black underwear she wore beneath. Even with nobody around to ogle her she felt disgustingly exposed, spending as much effort toward closing her legs as she did towards working her wrists, but the show remained lewdly open for viewing.

It wouldn't have made a difference anyway, Serena knew, huffing a frustrated sigh into the wadded, sweat-soaked stocking taped inside her mouth. Nothing mattered. Everything she had tried to free herself had failed, leaving her an exhausted, perspiration-soaked mess, her once-neat blonde hair matted against her skin in damp, clinging clumps. She was still here, secured to the storage room shelf by countless bands of duct tape, her breasts straining against her sleeveless grey blouse thanks to the mercilessly tight grasp of the silvery bands above and below her bust. Still gagged, still blindfolded, her golden ponytail twisted among the ropes that pinned her elbows so strictly together, shaking, terrified, whimpering but screaming at herself inside.

_Failure. Failure. Failure._

It was all her fault. All of it. Her Pokemon were gone, in the clutches of an organization that had no qualms with killing. She was trapped, unable to save them, let alone the world. At best she was going to be a burden to Calem and the others, the _real_ heroes, the ones who were _really_ good enough. At worst, her ineptitude and baseless courage had doomed them all.

_Stupid. So stupid._

These thoughts had echoed through her head again and again, and there had been no lighter ones to chase them away.

She couldn't stand it anymore. She wanted to scream. _Had_ screamed, until her throat was hoarse, but the tape and the foul-tasting stocking had swallowed up the sounds and left only hollow, stifled moans to bounce around the emptiness of the storeroom. Everything ached, she felt _filthy_ in more ways than one, and more than anything, she wanted her friends back.

Silence was the only answer to her prayers, silence and silence and silence... until finally, the door clicked and opened.

_Calem?!_ Her heart lifted, but her mind knew it wasn't her neighbor.

"Good. You're still here."

The scornful, mocking voice of the male Team Flare grunt who had so eagerly helped to tie her up floated into the room, and Serena's soaring heart fell leaden to the earth. She could almost still feel his greedy hands working their way up and down her legs, squeezing her calves and her thighs as he pleased, and the memories brought a fresh wave of nausea with them. She didn't want him anywhere _near_ her, but she could hear his boots clanking against the floor, coming closer with every step.

"Oh, the things I could do to you."

Rough fingertips grazed Serena's cheek, tracing the edge of the duct tape sealed against her skin. She recoiled, sickened by his touch, but the grunt ignored her harried, snorted breaths and muffled groan of displeasure, his palm sliding forward to cup her jaw in an almost gentle caress. His hand was warm, warmer and more human than anything she had touched in what felt like years of shivering loneliness...

Yet she preferred the constricting, grinding embrace of the ropes against her skin to the touch of the grunt's slithering, probing fingers. She could feel his coiffed red hair scraping against her face as his lips swept in to meet her ear, his hand shifting down to grasp her delicate throat just tight enough to make her heart twist in terror.

"You're lucky we don't have more time together."

Something jolted against her arm, the sound of tearing filled her ears, and for one horrid moment Serena thought that her blouse was being torn away. She squealed, tried to squirm away, but the multitude of makeshift restraints held her firmly in place as something was ripped away from her, the band of tape pressing against her breasts slowly peeling away...

_...Huh?_

The circuit of clinging adhesive was torn away from Serena's body in a single thick clump, tugging at her blouse and leaving her bare arms stinging, and it took the girl a few moments to realise that the grunt was not undressing her, but unbinding her from the shelving. Setting her free. She sagged in relief, gasping a sob into her gag as she felt him unwrapping the maze of duct tape wound around her body and the metal post, stripping the clinging silver from her chest and her stomach and lifting the crushing pressure that had made it so very hard to breathe. She inhaled gratefully, taking in desperate breaths through her nose as he ripped the last of it away, leaving her still too tightly bound to free herself but much less _suffocated_ than she had been before.

"Consider yourself lucky the boss took an interest in you." The grunt sounded none too happy about it, and while Serena wasn't exactly thrilled by the idea of confronting Lysandre with out her Pokemon herself, it was better than staying taped up for hours on end. "We're taking you to the shelter. You'll be safe there when the weapon goes off. Maybe when we're done and Team Flare are the only people still alive, you can even help us... repopulate."

Even the sweaty stocking stuffed in her mouth hadn't made Serena want to retch _that_ much.

"Let's get you on your feet." Without waiting for anything as unnecessary as permission, the grunt dragged the pony-tailed trainer away from the shelving by her shoulders, bringing her sliding across the smooth metal floor on her rope-snared shins. Then, with not a hint of concern, he planted a hand on her sternum and shoved her onto her back, sending her bare knees skyward and her skirt drifting down to her hips, the pleated red fabric pooling about her waist and leaving her exposed to his eyes.

Serena knew, her cheeks as red as her captor's stylish suit, but there was nothing she could do about it. She couldn't fight it, couldn't even close her legs with her ankles still crossed over, so she tried her hardest not to think about the view she was giving him as his poking, probing fingers searched out the knots. All she could see was darkness, but the theft of her precious sight only made her feel his roaming hands more keenly, plucking at this, rubbing at that, dancing their way along her thighs and calves, testing her resolve to stay calm with every errant exploration...

Then his knuckle grazed the lower reaches of her panties, and Serena went as still as stone.

_No. No no no..._

"Sorry. _Accident_." Uncaringly deadpan, the grunt set his fingers to work at unpicking one of the myriad of knots dotting her thighs, seemingly content with that single violation. Even so, Serena remained completely unmoving as he painstakingly worked at the knot, terrified into submission, a stampede of unwelcome, horrifying thoughts trampling through her head. If he wanted to... if he was going to _do things_ to her, there was no way she could resist. She couldn't shake him off, or run away, and there was nowhere to hide from his warm, dexterous _paws_...

"Oh, screw this." The sound of metal sliding on metal, and she felt something flat and cold against her thigh, working its way through the paper-thin gap between rope and shaking skin. "Hold still if you don't want your leg sliced up. I'm cutting you out of this, so behave if you know what's good for you."

A knife. She had suspected that was what he had used to tear her out of the thick bands of tape, but this was the first time the blade had touched her directly, and she let out a muffled groan as he began to cut through the tight web of cords keeping her calves trapped against her thighs. At least he'd warned her before she jerked about in fright, a kindness she wouldn't have expected from the well-dressed thug, but any flimsy trust that could have built between them had already been eroded by the memory of his knuckle scraping against her crotch for that fleeting but dreadful instant, and those ominous words, "you're lucky we don't have more time together."

A messy, hacking cut, sawing through woven cord and leaving frayed ends in its wake. Another. A third. Sharp, swift tugs against Serena's legs that the trainer was unable to see, but the way the ropes fell loose from her thighs told her all she needed to know. Inch by inch, she was freed from the bindings that had kept her on her knees for so long, and when the grunt finally sliced his way through the ropes pinning her ankles in their awkward cross, she immediately straightened her legs against the floor, digging her heels into the solid metal, stretching her aching muscles for the first time in what felt like forever and allowing her skirt to settle over her hips, affording her a little more modesty, but not as much as she would have liked.

"All right. All right." Scooping up the ruined ropes and dragging them aside, the grunt looked Serena up and down, the girl sensing his roving glare despite her blindfold and the red-tinted sunglasses that his his eyes from view. "So, here's the deal. You're staying tied up, but I'm gonna make this a little easier on you. You mess around with me and I got this knife still, and you remember Mightyena? Yeah, I still got him here, too. You got all that?"

A nod, hesitant and reluctant. What else could she do?

"Good." She felt him shifting, and then a rush of movement as she was hauled back into a sitting position, the grunt's hands splayed against her back to guide her into place. She was given no time to acclimatize herself before the ropes binding her nearly-numb arms behind her began to jerk and constrict, and she went still as a statue as she realised that he was cutting her arms free as well, her elbows, then her wrists, hacking through the cords that had so effectively immobilized her as if they were nothing, freeing her trapped ponytail from its woven prison in the process.

When the last rope fell away her hands swooped towards her face like lightning, ignoring the dagger-sharp aches that flashed through her muscles at the sudden movement. It could _all_ be ignored, even the painful tearing of duct tape against her soft blonde hair as she dug her fingers into her blindfold and ripped the thick silver band away from her head. Wide grey eyes, red and damp from crying, blinked to adjust to the dim grey light of the storeroom, darting to her captor and his familiar red outfit before hurriedly glancing away.

Instinct demanded she flip down her skirt to cover herself, and she tried not to notice the grunt's look of disappointment as she pulled it back down to her knees where it belonged. Her feet were still bare from her knees down, but there wasn't much she could do about that with her shoes nowhere in sight, one stocking clinging to the inside of her ruined blindfold along with strands of long blonde hair, the other still stuffed inside her mouth...

Reminded, she let her hands rise to her cheeks, looked at the grunt to see if he meant to stop her, and she he didn't react, peeled away the strips of tape his friend had plastered across her mouth. It hurt, no matter how slowly she took it, but spitting out the sweat-and-saliva-soaked stocking that had laid against her tongue for untold hours was worth it, and she spluttered as the grey bundle of cloth landed on the floor with a wet _plop_ , wiping her tongue against her forearm just to rid herself of the taste.

It didn't work, but it was a start.

"Okay, uh... get those stockings back on." The grunt stooped down to pick up the blindfold, wrenching the sweaty hose free of the duct tape and tossing it into Serena's lap. The trainer stared down at it, confused, but the hard expression on the thug's face told her not to argue, and she rolled the stocking up in her fingers before slipping it onto her left foot, trying not to wince at how slimy it felt as she slipped it back up her leg to her knee. Gross, but maybe walking barefoot in a place like this wasn't the best idea.

"Don't forget the other one," her observer reminded her, nodding towards the stocking that had just parted ways with her mouth.

"You've got to be kidding..." Serena plucked the soaked wad of cloth from the floor between thumb and forefinger, disgusted, but the guard's malicious grin told her that she wasn't being given a choice. Slowly, her face folding into a nauseated mask, she stretched out the dripping stocking and dipped her toe inside, rolling the garment over her foot and her ankle, all the way up her calf to her knee. Wearing her own cooling saliva wasn't the most pleasant sensation in the world, but it beat coping with the sickening taste, and she put up with it as she climbed to her feet, taking a moment to steady herself on her aching legs. "There. Happy?"

"I'll be happy when I've secured you." The grunt reached to his side, where a bright red satchel she hadn't noticed before hung on a shoulder strap.

Serena swallowed. In her elation at being released from her restraints, she had forgotten that he had spoken of tying her up again, and now the time had come to pay the piper. She wrapped her arms around her chest as if she could protect herself, knowing full well that she was at his mercy. "Um... what are you going to do?"

"Go easy on you. To a point." His hand left the confines of his satchel, clutching a pair of wide silver hoops linked together by a single link of chain. Serena flinched as she recognized them as handcuffs, but she dared not complain - this wasn't going to be fun, but it hardly compared to hours spent in a maze of rope and tape.

Nervously, she offered him her hands, but the grunt was unsatisfied with her gesture of compliance. Clapping one of the cuffs shut around her right wrist, locking it just tight enough to scrape against bone no matter which way Serena twisted, he snatched at her arms and twisted them back behind her waist, only then snapping the opposing cuff closed around her left wrist. The young trainer bit her lower lip as she tested this new restriction, uncomfortable but vastly preferring this predicament to the other. This she could deal with, for now.

If only she knew how to pick locks.

"We're just about done," the grunt informed her, stroking his chin in thought. Serena had hoped that the handcuffs would be the extent of her restraints, but the sight of her captor fishing around in his satchel once more put a damper on that faint hope. When it came back out, fingers clutching a red leather strap with a silver buckle at either end and a large red rubber ball at the center, the pony-tailed trainer was left momentarily mystified, trying to deduce what the item was but already certain she wouldn't like it.

The grunt was quick to prove her correct on that score. Grasping the strap with a hand at either end of the shiny red sphere, he lifted the ballgag up, guiding it towards her face. "Open your mouth."

"Huh?" Serena blinked. Glanced at the rubber ball. Looked back at the grunt, uncertain dread on her face. "Do you mean... is _that_ supposed to fit in..." Her tongue traced the outside of her lips as if to prove it couldn't be done. If that was meant for her mouth, then the straps were... she was beginning to understand the principle behind the item, but... "I don't think it's going to-"

"It will."

The grunt lunged, snatching at Serena's ponytail with one hand, and her startled cry was all the opportunity he needed to ram the thick sphere home with the other. His palm clamped over her opened mouth, popping the ball behind Serena's teeth before she could close them, and neither flailing tongue nor panicked squeal could stop him from gathering the straps behind her head, threading them together and buckling them tight.

Serena reeled, stumbling forward on her stocking-clad feet, her wrists twisting futilely against the handcuffs as a litany of slobbering grunts left her straining lips. What the heck _was_ this thing?! Her stocking had been a mouthful, but the ball stretched her jaw to its limit, trapping it wide open and stubbornly resisting her every attempt to dislodge it. She could already feel saliva gathering around the gargantuan obstruction, threatening to spill loose and fall, the gag preventing her even from swallowing it properly and leaving her spitting a mess of slurred, distorted syllables when she begged her captor to take the wretched thing _out_.

"Wow. I have _got_ to let the others see this." A phone came out of the goon's pocket, sickeningly red of course, the click of a shutter leaving Serena's watering eyes wide and stricken. "Just in case I can't show them in person," he noted, thumbing the screen of the device and smirking at what he saw. "Oh, and as a wallpaper. Man, you really need to think about your life decisions. How many times did you think you could try this hero routine and get away with it?"

Serena's answer was a lowered gaze, tears on her cheeks and a dark, damp stain on the front of her rumpled blouse.

The grunt shook his head, clapping a hand on her shoulder and jerking her upright. "What a joke. Okay, time to get you out of here. Start walking, princess, truck's waiting."

~ ~ ~

"We brought the girl."

The voice of the female grunt from earlier was barely audible from within the steel walls of the rear of the truck, but Serena was able to make it out, lifting her head from where it had rested against the side of the dark, cramped container.

"Excellent." _That_ voice, Serena recognized even more readily than that of her tormentors. The heavy, forceful baritone of Lysandre, the leader of Team Flare, was a difficult one to mistake for someone else, and the trainer felt a chill run down her spine at the knowledge that he was just outside of the truck, mere feet away from her. The man behind everything, the one who sought to bring a veil of death down upon the world, all to bring about his ideal future.

She had wanted nothing more than to face and defeat him, but now Serena dreaded the moment they next met.

"What should we do with her, boss?" This time it was the male grunt who spoke, this voice coming from even closer. From behind the double doors at the rear of the truck, just to Serena's left, perhaps.

A moment of quiet, then Lysandre's rumbling voice again. "Take her to Room D7. Lock her in. I shall speak to her again when the deed is done and there is no more point in resistance."

Then, silence again... until almost a minute later, when the rear doors shuddered, then began to open.

Light spilled into the container, illuminating the heavy boxes marked with Team Flare's insignia that had taken up almost the entirety of the space within. In the thin sliver of empty space between the cargo and the door, Serena blinked against the harsh glare of day, the thin trail of drool seeping from her ball-gagged lips sparkling like a diamond necklace. Her hands were still cuffed snugly behind her back, her cheeks damp where countless tears had streaked their way down her face, her legs still spread out across the truck's corrugated bed while the strap of her gag remained padlocked to one of the many horizontal struts lining the vehicle's inner walls. It had been a long, bumpy ride from Lumiose, and while Serena had hoped for at least a little more sleep during the trip, she was even more exhausted now than she had been when the male grunt had locked her in here.

Red shifted amidst the glare, and a crimson-suited grunt climbed up into the truck, pulling themselves to their feet.

"Serena, we're here, honey!"

It took a few moments more for Serena to determine that the chirping voice was the female grunt, the one who had been responsble for the majority of her restraints back in the underground base, moments that the red-suited woman used to loom over the trainer and look her over, her glasses glinting in the sunlight. Serena remembered those cruel hands of hers working their wicked magic, eagerly binding her limbs beyond movement and layering her face in duct tape, and cringed away from her with a dark look in her grey eyes somewhere between fear and hatred.

"Hmph. Killjoy." Sneering down her nose at Serena, the grunt dropped into a crouch, her finger darting forward to poke at the bright red ball peeking between the handcuffed trainer's wide-stretched lips. "Slobbering up a storm there, huh? I guess if he fit this thing in there after all, you had an even bigger mouth than I thought."

A chuckle from behind her, and Serena lifted her shamed, blushing face to see the male grunt climbing into the truck behind his cohort. "It was a bit of a tight squeeze, but I got it in there. Pretty sure we surprised _everyone_ there, eh, Serena?"

"Tah it ouh..." Her gaze fell again, miserable and beaten. She knew her plea would fall on deaf ears, knew they were loving the sight of their nemesis degraded and drooling all over herself, and knew by their calculating looks alone that this would not be the worst they inflicted on her.

"Hmm... nnnnnnno." The female grunt snorted. "I don't think so. You just feel free to keep sucking on that while we... hey." She tipped her sunglasses down with a finger, revealing a pair of narrowed green eyes that scanned Serena with the clinical edge of a predator. "You let her keep all her clothes? I figured you'd... uh, did you even put her _stockings_ back on? Didn't we shove those in her-"

"I liked them on her." The male coughed, and Serena flinched, disgusted. The stocking that had spent so long stuffed inside her mouth had finally dried against the warmth of her leg, but the tight-fitting cloth still felt revoltingly unclean, even more so than its sweaty twin. He... liked these on her? What did _that_ mean?

The female grunt paused, then shrugged, setting her tinted glasses back into place. "Well, whatever floats your boat. Maybe we can mess with those pretty clothes of hers a bit when we get her inside. Who knows what could happen to her when she's locked up in the bottom floor, so deep inside the earth that nobody will ever hear her scream?"

Serena knew that the woman was waxing theatrical for her benefit, but that didn't stop the heavy chill from settling in the pit of her stomach.

~ ~ ~

Room D7 was everything one might expect from a subterranean cell, and nothing more.

The plain white walls were hardly welcoming as the two grunts bundled the handcuffed Serena into the tiny chamber, the sterile metal flooring no more comfortable on her stocking-clad than the store room or the truck had been, but one thing she was grateful for was the absence of any extra sets of prying eyes to scrutinise her. Being led through Team Flare's main HQ with her hands cuffed behind her back, ballgagged and tearful, shown off like a trophy and leered at by a seemingly neverending line of grunts and admins she had once beaten in battle... the last ten minutes had not been the proudest of Serena's life, and she was almost _glad_ to be shut away in a room with only the two more familiar sadists.

Almost.

"There's a lock on the door," the red-suited woman said nonchalantly as she drew that very door closed, the mechanical paneling sliding into place in the wall with only a small white handle to prove there had ever been a gap to begin with, "but the boss is counting on us to make sure Serena here stays put. Isn't that right?"

The other grunt nodded his agreement, grinning. "Yeah. It's our job to take care of her until the weapon does its thing. Better make sure we do it right."

"Uh-huh." Pleased with their pantomime, the female grunt reached behind her back, drawing something around to her front. Serena hadn't noticed the bright red backpack before, but she was sure noticing the bulging bag _now_. "So I guess we'd really better go to town on her this time. Since she loves meddling so much."

It didn't take a genius to realize where this was going, but when the backpack was pulled open and the grunts began to draw out neat coils of thin red rope, the walls of the narrow cell seemed to shift even closer.

_No! Not again! Not this again!_

Serena inched backward in panic, her thinly-clad feet padding nervously against the smooth, cold floor, retreating until her handcuffed arms crashed into the unyielding wall behind her. Her eyes flitted from one grunt to the other and back again, filled with wild terror, searching desperately for a hint of mercy and finding none in their opaque sunglasses. Her straining lips blurted garbled sounds that even she didn't understand, trembling murmurs that achieved nothing but coaxing a new trickle of drool to wander down her chin and making her twin tormentors smile like sharks.

The female grunt nodded to her companion. "Grab her."

"Nuh _nuh nuh NUH_!" Pitiful whimpers became screams of denial as the male grunt stalked towards Serena, snatching at her arm and locking it in a death-grip, dragging her back across the floor on her stumbling, flailing feet. Fresh tears sprang to the girl's frantic eyes as she was spun around to face the man, her shackled arms presented to the woman, trapped between them with nowhere to run... but no amount of tears would save her from the touch of rope against her still-aching elbows.

This red cord was thinner than the other rope, not quite as rough on her skin, but that was hardly a comfort as her arms were drawn to each other once more, corralled in a closing noose and yanked close with a sharp, painful tug. Biting down on her gag as much as the mouth-filling sphere would allow her to, Serena resisted the urge to cry out this time, closing her eyes tight as the rope jerked and rubbed against her, tightened with every clever knot. Her shoulders flared with familiar aches once more, as if she had never been freed.

Her handcuffs clicked and fell away, but with her elbows securely tied as one there was nothing she could do with her hands to save herself. They were captured with ease, forced together wrist to wrist and wrapped in rope until there was no hope of parting them, knots fastened out of reach of her fingers and too complex to blindly unpick.

"Lift her blouse."

The female grunt's abrupt command sent shock across the faces of both of the other people in the room, but only her male counterpart's surprise warped into unrestrained glee. Screaming in protest, Serena tried to twist herself away from the man's grasping fingers, but feminine hands seized her forearms and held her in place, keeping the blonde trainer's panicked bucking to a minimum as the lower hem of her drool-speckled top was drawn out of the waistband of her skirt and tugged upward. The grey fabric peeled away from her skin, sweatier than even she had realized, and Serena blushed and cringed in shame as the blouse was lifted to her chin, her breasts bouncing into view, their modest curves still cupped by her simple black bra.

For several deeply uncomfortable moments she was forced to stand there as not one but both of them ogled her, the female grunt peering eagerly over Serena's shoulder while the male studied her through his glasses. Neither one moved to touch them, a small relief among the humiliation, but by the time they finally lost interest she felt more than violated enough.

Then came the rough grip of rope against her chest, threads of red pulled taut around her shoulders and pushing down onto her bust, and suddenly a glance or two didn't seem so bad. Practiced hands wound the doubled-over cord around and around Serena's body, over her breasts and under, pinning her upper arms against her back and her blouse in its new position, criss-crossing her sides and collarbone and trapping her already helpless frame in a sadistically tight network of rope that squeezed her arms and breasts from every direction. She lost track of time as she was restricted more and more, minutes passing her by as knots were tightened and loops constricted, and when she finally let her brain consider more than where the next strand was going, she found herself breathless and pained, every tiny wriggle causing rope to bite her in a dozen different places.

Why had they doubled down on tying her up when he hadn't stood a chance of escaping what they had done to her back in the storeroom, she didn't know for sure, but the malicious delight they took in her steadily worsening predicament left Serena with a few guesses.

It hurt, and she groaned her dismay into her ballgag, her eyes half-lidding as she adjusted herself to the discomfort. How long were they going to keep like this? When would this finally be _over_?

Where was Calem? Shauna? ...Her Pokemon?

"That should remind you who's boss." The female goon's hand whipped out, palm cracking against Serena's backside, drawing an outraged squeal from the trainer's rubber-filled mouth. She tried to squirm away, but the woman's hands drew her straight back into her grasp, one hooking around Serena's waist to pin her close, the other climbing to the back of her ponytail and tearing away her hairtie. Blonde hair fell loose around her face, spilling over her shoulders in a messy, lank curtain, tumbling all the way down her back to her skirt and drifting against her bare, bound arms. "Yeah, I thought that'd look better," the grunt murmured against her cheek, planting her palms against Serena's shoulders and shoving her forward against the awestruck male's chest. "Get her down on her stomach. We're not done yet."

There was no way for her to resist. The male grunt's hands forced her down to her knees, then lowered her upper body with both hands until her chest touched the cold metal floor, her bra providing almost no protection from the all-pervading chill. She tried not to notice the occasional bump of his hands against her breasts, willingly passing them off to herself as tiny accidents, remaining still as he guided her into their desired position. Once she was fully resting on the floor, she felt his hands grasp her ankles through her dirty stockings and lift them up into the air, bringing Serena's wriggling feet up and over until her heels poked against her strictly bound hands.

Of course, the following seconds of silent inactivity only heralded more rope.

Red cords gathered around her ankles, collecting them in their tight embrace and binding them together. The rope was looped around them twice, three times, then a fourth, before the grunt's fingers poked a trailing length of cord between Serena's tethered forearms and out the other side, tugging it tight and pinning the blonde girl's ankles against her wrists in a merciless hogtie.

She cried out, bleating into her gag, lips spilling drool onto the floor beneath her face as the grunt secured and knotted her into her new arrangement. Of course, her protests meant nothing; her male captor was just as efficient in restraining her as his comrade, and by the time he was finished there was no working her compacted body into a more comfortable position. She could wriggle, twist, _maybe_ roll herself onto her side.... and that was it. She was stuck. _Again_.

She wanted to cry, and it took her a few moments to realise that she already was.

"That ought to hold you." The female grunt smiled her sadistic approval, offering a high-five that the male grunt gleefully accepted. "Maybe if you're a good girl, we'll come in and untie you when the plan is complete. Until then, you just sit tight and wait for the _biiiiiiig_ boom, and that's when you'll know your family and friends are all dead."

Physical suffering had pushed that terrifying reality to the back of Serena's mind, but the criminal's taunt brought everything flooding back. She sobbed, burying her face against the floor, not even caring that her cheek splashed down into a tepid puddle of her own drool. Everything hurt, inside and out. Everything was falling apart.

She barely noticed the door clicking shut, the two red-suited grunts waving with grins on their faces as the panel slid into place.

~ ~ ~

Again, minutes passed, and Serena had no way to measure them.

Since the goons had left her alone, there had been nothing to occupy her mind but the stresses wreaking havoc through her body and mind. Her bonds hadn't loosened in the slightest, and while she had at least managed to roll onto her side, the new position was scarcely more comfortable to the hogtied trainer. She was still obscenely gagged with the rubber ball and strap, her blouse still gathered beneath her chin and trapped there by the web of rope that made every twitch a torment, still tired, still frantic, still waiting and _waiting_ for the sound of the ultimate weapon being discharged, and praying it wouldn't come. Her nerves were frayed to hell, her grey eyes staring dully at the wall, her tears stilled only by her weariness.

Then, the door opened, and a pair of black hiking boots stepped into her limited field of view.

" _Serena_!"

_...Calem...?_

By the time she recognized her neighbor's voice, the young man was already at her side, his firm hands plunging into her loose blonde hair and ripping open the buckle he found there. A choking cough wracked her slender frame as Calem gently pulled the thick rubber sphere from her mouth, dropping the saliva-slick ball to the floor and staring wildly at the maze of rope the grunts had left her in.

His dark brown eyes, normally soft and kind, hardened to flint. "What did they do to you...?"

" _C-Calem..._ " All at once she had tears to shed again, and she sobbed as he picked at the twisted conundrum of knots woven around her arms, pain and relief warring inside of her and leaving her a confused, heartsick mess. He'd come for her. He'd really, really come for her... but... "Calem, there's no time... the weapon..."

"Don't worry." The fire in her neighbor's eyes assured her that the enormity of the situation wasn't lost on him, but he made no move to leave her side. "We have a little time. The others are all here, and we got some help from Cyllage, too. Just hold still and let me... ugh, I'll have to cut you out of this. I've got a knife here, give me a second..."

Serena sniffed, willing herself to shut off the waterworks, working her aching jaw and breathing in precious oxygen. It was going to be okay. For the first time in what seemed like a year, she could really believe that. "M-my Pokemon..." she began, swallowing hard before she dared ask the question. "D-did you find them?"

"They took your Pokemon?" Calem frowned, straightening his red cap on his dark-haired head with one hand as he produced a small pocket knife from his thick blue jacket with the other. "No, we haven't found them yet, but there are still some admins down here we haven't run across yet. Lysandre, too." Slipping the blade of the knife between Serena's elbow and the dense coils of bright red rope, he began to saw through her restraints, trying not to notice the way her blouse had been lifted and tucked beneath the ropes.

Serena blushed, catching the way his eyes darted to her barely covered chest before returning to her work, but she chose to say nothing. She had much bigger problems with a little voyeurism right now, and if she were completely honest with herself, Calem wasn't exactly the _last_ person she would want looking at her that way someday...

It took several minutes to free her from the hogtie, even with the aid of the knife, but once Calem had cut Serena's wrists and elbows free, she was able to speed the process along, only too happy to tear at the coils of rope ensnaring her chest and drop her blouse back into place. Before long she was able to stand up, brushing herself down and sweeping her sweaty blonde hair away from her haggard face, her toes flexing against the metal floor in her slightly damp stockings, still feeling strange without shoes but more than willing to cope. 

"T-thank you, Calem," she murmured, too tired to throw herself into his arms as she might have wanted.

"You're welcome, Serena." His cheeks still a little pink but his eyes alight with determination, Calem handed his friend a small red-and-white sphere, about the same size as the ball gag that lay forgotten on the floor. "Here. If they took your Pokemon, then you can use her again. I kept her with me."

_Her...?_ There was no doubt in Serena's mind who he was referring to. The small telltale scrape on the red hemisphere of the Poke Ball a match for the one on a ball she had once owned, the one that contained the Skiddo she had once traded to Calem for his Eevee. The little goat was most likely a lot stronger than she had been back then, knowing Calem, but the familiarity of the ball in her hand was courage enough for her to manage a smile. Uncertain, exhausted, but a smile.

She was going to get her Eevee back. Her Meowstic too, and Absol, and all the rest.

Serena was a trainer, and she was not going to lose again.


End file.
